Join us for an evening of great songs played by superlative musicians as Boston-based acoustic music collective Session Americana takes the stage. In this intimate yet highly theatrical show, a group of top-notch singer-songwriters come together to swap songs and instruments, inviting the audience to share in their warmth, joy, and camaraderie.

Now how could you go wrong with a group that bills itself as a "Fabulous Female Folkestra." Four singer-songwriters with a knack for catchy hooks and an unerring eye for the absurd range freely across the contemporary American landscape, leaving no icon untoppled.

Join us for the Jazzschool Institute vocal department’s end-of-semester performances. Under the direction of Laurie Antonioli, vocal performance students learn a broad range of styles, from “great American songbook” standards to bebop and beyond, developing a repertoire of 100 songs over the eight-semester course.

The Freight brims with amazing music and heaps of aloha tonight when we present the Hawaiian Slack Key Guitar Festival, spotlighting ki ho'alu, the guitar style that Hawaiian cowboys developed in the 19th century when they loosened their guitar strings (or "slacked" them) to create a deep, resonant sound.

The Freight joins forces with The Berkeley Old-Time Music Convention to host BOTMC’s Spring Situation community open house, a free afternoon of old-time stringband picking, singing and dancing, including a family dance, cabaret-style concert sets, jam sessions and workshops galore on all manner of making music with people.

When Andre Thierry was three years old, the King of Zydeco—the late great Clifton Chenier—grabbed him by the arms and declared him a future accordion player. Today, Andre is a virtuoso on all types of accordion, a soulful singer, and an exceptional multi-dimensional musician who seamlessly blends old and new, building from his love for traditional zydeco to create a unique sound for contemporary generations.

Kathy Kallick returns to our stage with her beloved Mother's Day concert, promising big fun for all! This show, a (nearly) annual tradition for more than 20 years, will put a song in your heart and a smile on your face, with a flower for every mother and a grand finale extravaganza where Kathy invites all the kids on stage to dance and sing along!

Barbara Dane is a true institution in the universe of jazz, blues, and folk music. After graduating high school in Detroit, she raised her strong voice regularly at demonstrations for racial equality and economic justice as well as sitting in with local bands.

Check
out the future when the West Coast Songwriters presents its monthly
Songwriter Competition, where members take the stage and perform their
material. Performers sign up from 7:00 to 7:20, and at 7:30 the show’s
on! Guest judges award a “Best Song” and “Best Performance.” The most
active songwriters’ association in the United States, WCS is dedicated
to providing the environment, opportunities, and tools to nurture and
promote songwriters.

All
performers
are welcome to participate in this event that has produced
some of our brightest performers, including: Shawn Colvin, Dana Carvey,
Alvin Youngblood Hart, and Patrick Landeza.

HERE'S HOW IT WORKS!
One unique aspect of our Open Mic is that, unlike those held in noisy
bars where people show up in spite of the fact that there's live music,
you will be playing to a supportive group of friends and performers who
are actually listening!!!

An exciting, high-energy performer, Sam Rudin attacks and caresses the keyboard with great rhythmic intensity, romping through a broad range of 20th century American music. A compelling vocalist whose rough-hewn voice brims with drama and humor, he can evoke the spirit of Fats Waller, Oscar Peterson, Mose Alison, and Jerry Lee Lewis—sometimes all at the same time.

Come hitch a ride to honky-tonk heaven with Bill Kirchen, as the "Titan of the Telecaster" and his band Too Much Fun perform old favorites and newly penned originals, including selections from Word to the Wise, his 2010 all-star duet CD.

Make sure you join the party when the Evie Ladin Band opens the box on the toe-tapping material from their new CD! Tenacious, innovative string musicians/dancers with a quirky neo-trad soul, the Evie Ladin Band throw down music with an unusually creative and surprising live show.

Spanish Gypsy flamenco legend Manuel Agujetas is an outstanding, controversial singer, anarchic and unpredictable, with a vocal style that a Village Voice writer memorably described as "a well-modulated primal scream—an exquisitely controlled shriek of anguish and despair . . . it does have a sheer animal quality to it".

Classical at the Freight celebrates National Chamber Music Month by presenting four outstanding San Francisco Chamber Orchestra All-Stars in a virtuosic program of chamber music favorites by Mozart, Beethoven, and others. The concert features Tod Brody (flute), Elizabeth Choi (violin), Alexandra Leem (viola), and Hannah Addario-Berry (cello).

Join us for this fabulous and festive, multi-faceted concert, with proceeds benefiting the beloved circus and performing arts camp, Camp Winnarainbow. With His Eminence of Clowndom, camp founder Wavy Gravy as host, the show features Jonathan Richman, the Barry Melton Band, with special guest Nick Gravenites!

Banjo whiz Noam Pikelny takes his instrument to new levels of intensity, incorporating contemporary elements with a classic old-time drive. His extraordinary playing has made waves in Leftover Salmon, the John Cowan Band, and more recently in envelope-pushing americana chamber group the Punch Brothers, as well as on his solo projects like the recent CD, Beat the Devil & Carry a Rail.

Since the mid-1970s Pierre Bensusan's name has been synonymous with contemporary acoustic guitar genius. Working in open tuning with his steel strings tuned to the modal, mystical-sounding DADGAD, Pierre is a composer, singer, and acoustic guitar visionary of passionate intensity with an extraordinarily tender, joyful touch.

In this special afternoon performance the Abraham Lincoln Brigade Archives (ALBA) celebrates the 76th reunion of the Lincoln Brigade, Americans who volunteered to fight against Franco's fascists in the Spanish Civil War. Guest speaker Kate Doyle, 2012 recipient of the ALBA/Puffin Human Rights Award, discusses genocide and justice in Guatemala. The program also includes an update on former Spanish judge Baltasar Garzón, an outspoken champion of human rights.

All
performers
are welcome to participate in this event that has produced
some of our brightest performers, including: Shawn Colvin, Dana Carvey,
Alvin Youngblood Hart, and Patrick Landeza.

HERE'S HOW IT WORKS!
One unique aspect of our Open Mic is that, unlike those held in noisy
bars where people show up in spite of the fact that there's live music,
you will be playing to a supportive group of friends and performers who
are actually listening!!!

Returning to the Freight stage after a rousing set at last year's Pomegranates & Figs show, Eliyahu & The Qadim Ensemble perform a dizzying range of beautiful, passionate music. With repertoire from the Arabic, Jewish, Turkish Sufi, Hebrew-Yemenite, Armenian, Ladino, and Moroccan traditions, the group celebrates the common musical and spiritual heritage of the region's cultures while honoring the great diversity found within them.

In a show that is sure to inspire both kids and adults to laugh, dance, and sing in English and Spanish, beloved educator, author, and musician José-Luis Orozco performs an hour-long benefit concert for Bay Area Hispano Institute for Advancement (BAHIA).

Freight favorites Robin Flower and Libby McLaren regale us with their modern Celtic americana style in an evening of exhilarating instrumentals, tight vocal harmonies, creative energy, and loads of fun.

The Jazzschool's award-winning Advanced High School Jazz Workshops I & II, under directors Michael Zilber and Erik Jekabson, perform a variety of cutting-edge arrangements in their final performance of the 2011-12 season.

Submit your ears to the ”mindboggling” (Houston Chronicle) guitar playing of newgrass pioneer Dan Crary. A flatpicking stylist of great innovation and brilliance, Dan transcends the boundaries of style and genre.

Guitarist and songwriter extraordinaire Danny Click takes the stage with his all-acoustic Americana Orchestra, presenting unique, string-enhanced chamber music settings of his compelling songs of struggle and redemption.

David Gans is a veteran of the music business as a songwriter and performer, a folk festival favorite, and a radio producer (he hosts the nationally syndicated Grateful Dead Hour and Dead to the World on KPFA). Tonight, he performs his own engaging, "warmly cynical" songs within the americana and jam-band spectrums. David’s most recent full-length CD is The Ones That Look the Weirdest Taste the Best.

A steel guitar extravaganza like no other in recent Freight memory, In the Steel of the Night features three of the world's leading steel guitar players and their hot bands. The Bobby Black Quartet, Big Lou's Dance Party featuring David Phillips, and Joe Goldmark and the Seducers raise the roof as they dole out twang galore... and you are invited!

Marvelous mandolin innovator David Grisman and guitar virtuoso Frank Vignola fill our listening room with beautiful melodies, virtuoso musicianship, and plentiful good vibes as they serve up unique versions of some of their favorite jazz classics from the "great American songbook", spotlighting selections from the recent duo CD, Frank 'n' Dawg.

Join Grammy Award-winning singer, songwriter, and record producer Rodney Crowell and New York Times best-selling author Mary Karr for a CD release concert in support of their first collaboration, the album KIN (Vanguard), a collection of ballads and country rockers with rugged underpinnings and a thread of grace and redemption. Joining Rodney and Mary for tonight's show is special guest, guitarist Steuart Smith.

Pianist and songwriter Rachel parlays a background in poetry, social anthropology (her major at Harvard University), and a lifetime of instrumental study into songs that push the envelope of pop in search of deeper meaning. San Francisco Chronicle music editor David Weigand described her music this way: “The voice is airy, plaintive, the sound, at first, seemingly detached, but it isn’t long—about three notes will do it—before . . .

Check
out the future when the West Coast Songwriters presents its monthly
Songwriter Competition, where members take the stage and perform their
material. Performers sign up from 7:00 to 7:20, and at 7:30 the show’s
on! Guest judges award a “Best Song” and “Best Performance.” The most
active songwriters’ association in the United States, WCS is dedicated
to providing the environment, opportunities, and tools to nurture and
promote songwriters.

All
performers
are welcome to participate in this event that has produced
some of our brightest performers, including: Shawn Colvin, Dana Carvey,
Alvin Youngblood Hart, and Patrick Landeza.

HERE'S HOW IT WORKS!
One unique aspect of our Open Mic is that, unlike those held in noisy
bars where people show up in spite of the fact that there's live music,
you will be playing to a supportive group of friends and performers who
are actually listening!!!

It’s a party, and you’re invited for this gala night of rockin’ music, comedy, and a silent auction in celebration of Earth Island Institute's 30th anniversary. Lending their talents to this benefit show are the Rock Collection, comedian Will Durst, psychedelic rockers Whiskerman, and other special guests.

A perennial Freight favorite, the exuberant Barbara Higbie hosts some of the Bay Area’s finest musicians in a fundraising concert for the Freight & Salvage. Tonight’s lineup includes the Shelley Doty Band, Stevie Coyle, Austin Willacy, Girl Named T, and special guests Steve Meckfessel and Alison Burns, which all adds up to a fabulous evening highlighting the caliber and diversity of the Freight, a nonprofit dedicated to promoting public awareness and understanding of tr

All
performers
are welcome to participate in this event that has produced
some of our brightest performers, including: Shawn Colvin, Dana Carvey,
Alvin Youngblood Hart, and Patrick Landeza.

HERE'S HOW IT WORKS!
One unique aspect of our Open Mic is that, unlike those held in noisy
bars where people show up in spite of the fact that there's live music,
you will be playing to a supportive group of friends and performers who
are actually listening!!!

Bay Area trio Golden Bough bring a fresh feel and expert hand to haunting ballads, beautiful airs, and lively songs from the Celtic regions. With a repertoire rooted in the traditional music of Ireland, Scotland, Wales, the Isle of Man, French Brittany, and Spanish Galicia, these modern-day minstrels expand upon these styles with intriguing arrangements and original compositions.

Three iconic figures from Hawaiian traditional music—Marlene Sai, Gary Aiko, and Nina Kealiiwahamana—bring beautiful tunes and heaps of aloha to the Freight stage, joined by special guests Kenneth Makuakane and Jeff Au Hoy, and hosted by Patrick Landeza.

Two of the world's finest mandolinists, Mike Marshall and Caterina
Lichtenberg are masters of a variety of styles from around the world and
across the ages. For tonight’s exciting performance, Mike and Caterina
introduce Bay Area audiences to the virtuosic German mandolin/guitar duo
of Silke Lisko and Rupert Gerhman.

Hailing from the rain-drenched forests of Olympia, Washington, the Blackberry Bushes Stringband plays a delicate, bold brand of northwest acoustic americana that, like its thorny namesake, is deeply rooted and continuously growing. The group’s sound takes a solid bluegrass foundation, draws from American folk music, and adds influences from all over the map, from Appalachian old-time to indie rock and alt-country.

A five-man rock band without instruments, the House Jacks offer a "no-holds barred" a cappella style that obliterates all preconceptions about the limits of the human voice. Deke Sharon, Austin Willacy, and Troy Horne, plus new members John Pointer and Nick Gerard, run the gamut from tender love ballads to mile-a-minute funk, complete with mind-blowing vocal percussion and riffs torn straight out of a whammy-bar guitar.

Among the Freight's most popular acts, Marley's Ghost achieves the seemingly impossible with its audacious blend of English folk roots, gospel, country, reggae, R&B, even Scottish bagpipe tunes—and it all works like a dream! Come celebrate with the band as they release their 10th CD, Jubilee, a wildly eclectic roots-music tour de force mixing originals and deft interpretations of tunes from the songbooks of Kris Kristofferson, Levon Helm, John Prine, and more.

“Some day people are going to wake up to the fact that Woody Guthrie and the 10,000 songs that leap and tumble off the strings of his music box are a national possession, like Yellowstone or Yosemite, and part of the best stuff this
country has to show the world.”

Check
out the future when the West Coast Songwriters presents its monthly
Songwriter Competition, where members take the stage and perform their
material. Performers sign up from 7:00 to 7:20, and at 7:30 the show’s
on! Guest judges award a “Best Song” and “Best Performance.” The most
active songwriters’ association in the United States, WCS is dedicated
to providing the environment, opportunities, and tools to nurture and
promote songwriters.

All
performers
are welcome to participate in this event that has produced
some of our brightest performers, including: Shawn Colvin, Dana Carvey,
Alvin Youngblood Hart, and Patrick Landeza.

HERE'S HOW IT WORKS!
One unique aspect of our Open Mic is that, unlike those held in noisy
bars where people show up in spite of the fact that there's live music,
you will be playing to a supportive group of friends and performers who
are actually listening!!!

Two dynamic women composers rooted in jazz join for an evening of raucous and gorgeous improvisation with stellar Bay Area musicians and some special out-of-town visitors. The caravan, led by Angela Wellman and Jessica Jones, also features Afro-Peruvian cajon player Juan Medrano Cotito, vocalist Lori Wellman, Kev Choice on piano, Ayinde Webb on drums, and Amina Scott on bass—plus other special guests TBA!

Rolling Stone magazine dubbed Doug Paisley 2010 CD, ConstantCompanion, one of the year’s best singer-songwriter albums, and with good reason. This Toronto-born artist crafts sparse, soulful songs with folk and country echoes, gorgeous melodies thrown into stark relief by his straightforward, plain-spoken lyrics that manage to feel both open-ended and profound.

The electric jazz virtuosos in the trio Charged Particles cross stylistic boundaries, blending jazz styles with elements from Latin music, classical music, and funk to make music that is excitingly creative. Keyboard wizard Murray Low boggles the mind with his dazzling Latin-jazz technique and improvisational skills. Inventive electric bassist Jason Muscat and fiery drummer Jon Krosnick join him to create some of the most electrifying jazz in the country today.

Hailed for its spirited performances and fascinating fusion of Latin and folk rhythms with adventurous jazz explorations, the VNote Ensemble (formerly The Snake Trio) gives a voice to the hidden treasure of Venezuelan music. The band, formed in 1997, is committed to raising that voice and exploring the connection between North American jazz, traditional Venezuelan songs, and original musical ideas.

With influences ranging from Andres Segovia to Mississippi John Hurt,
Ed Gerhard is one of the true masters of steel string finger style
guitar. A Philadelphia native now residing in New Hampshire, Ed performs
with passionate intensity and a sly sense of humor on 6-string,
12-string, and slide guitars—including the esoteric and beautifully
toned Weissenborn (Hawaiian lap steel guitar).

All
performers
are welcome to participate in this event that has produced
some of our brightest performers, including: Shawn Colvin, Dana Carvey,
Alvin Youngblood Hart, and Patrick Landeza.

HERE'S HOW IT WORKS!
One unique aspect of our Open Mic is that, unlike those held in noisy
bars where people show up in spite of the fact that there's live music,
you will be playing to a supportive group of friends and performers who
are actually listening!!!

Brittany Haas of Crooked Still and Lauren Rioux from Darol Anger’s Republic of Strings join forces to make music steeped in intricate harmonies and filled with deep emotion. Together, these two consummate young fiddlers bring their knowledge of Appalachian music and their experience at the forefront of the contemporary string band scene to weave a tapestry of heartfelt vocals and progressive grooves.

Hailed as the “Mark Twain of Americana,” Paul Thorn brings his gritty, gospel-infused Southern rock straight from his hometown of Tupelo, Mississippi, where he grew up as the son of a Pentecostal preacher and went on to box in more than 50 professional bouts, including one with Roberto Duran—but that’s another story. Paul’s music mixes the hard-driving boogie of the Allman Brothers with the soulful wit of John Hiatt.

Heriberto “Tito” Gonzales and his talented band return to the Freight to play
rumba, guaracha, and son—traditional, high-energy Cuban dance music pioneered by greats like Arsenio Rodriguez and later revived by the film The Buena Vista Social Club.

The Gillette Brothers, Guy and Pipp, are taking a break from their cattle ranch in Crockett, Texas to bring real live cowboy music to Berkeley. These gents are the genuine article, winners of the American Cowboy Culture Award for Western Music and two-time winners of the Will Rogers Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Advancement of Contemporary Cowboy Music.